A wide shot of a ceramics studio, featuring students working with pottery wheels and other tools.
Portrait of a white person sitting next to a sculpted art piece

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Sonya Bogdanova

Lecturer

Contact

Bio

Bogdanova (she/they) is a Soviet-born Jewish immigrant who came to the US after the collapse of the USSR. Based in Chicago, she has shown in the US and internationally. Exhibitions: Chicago Cultural Center; Mana Contemporary; Gallery 400; G-CADD; Northern Illinois University; Roman Susan; Ignition Projects; Parlour and Ramp; Terrain Exhibitions; Flatland; No Nation Tangential Unspace Art Lab; Sylvia Rivera Law Project; Czong Institute for Contemporary Art. MFA, University of Illinois at Chicago; BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago. SAIC, City Colleges of Chicago, Chicago Art Partnerships in Education, and many more unofficial circumstances. Awards: 2023 Artist to Watch, Comfort Station; 2021 Artist in Residence, Holly & the Neighbors; 2019 Art Department Scholarship, University of Illinois, Chicago; 2015 Artist in Residence, Jiwar Foundation, Barcelona, Spain.

Personal Statement

Bogdanova's practice revolves around sculpture and painting, investigating issues of iconography, effigy-making, city-building, and the unthought known. Skeptical of accepted historical narratives, Bogdanova makes objects that act as portals into forgotten time.

Courses

Title Department Catalog Term

Description

This course introduces students to sculptural ideas executed in various ceramic hand construction techniques including slab, coil, press mold, etc. Students will explore how the unique physical characteristics of clay can contribute to the content of the work. Construction strategies will be examined in a conceptual context, investigating issues of space, technology, and architectural implication to build a dimensional perspective of personal and societal relevance. Emphasis will be on process, exploration, and discussion.

We will examine artists who've instrumentalized clay in inventive and boundary-pushing ways. Some of the artists we'll look at are Arlene Schechet, Annabeth Rosen, Ron Nagel, Huma Bhabha, Genesis Belanger and more. Readings and screenings will vary but typically include interviews with contemporary artists and critical essays by Eva Respini, Clare Lilley, Rosalind Krauss and more.

Students should expect to produce a body of work consisting of assigned and self directed projects to be presented in a culminating midterm and final critique.

Class Number

1194

Credits

3

Description

Historically understood as the ecstatic experience of religious consciousness, mysticism has grown to encompass all visionary human experience and the pursuit of ¿ultimate truth¿. We will travel down several veins of this rhizomatic structure in the hopes of understanding its complex form. This course combines two modalities: extensive studio time and reading/discussion of mystical, esoteric, and occult texts. Emphasis will be on ceramic hand building, process, and conceptual exploration. Some of the topics and figures discussed will be mystery, magic, paganism, surrealism and dreams, folk horror, denkbild, parapolitics, pre-Columbian relics, Stanley Kubrick, David Lynch, Louise Bourgeois, Rene Magritte, Huma Bhabha, Arlene Shechet and others. You can expect to produce a body of work consisting of assigned and self-directed projects to be presented in a culminating midterm and final critique.

Class Number

2130

Credits

3